Turns out Janet Jackson is the cybersecurity risk we never saw coming

Date:
Thu, 18 Aug 2022 20:08:28 +0000

Description:
1989 Janet Jackson hit Rhythm Nation could crash your computer and no, it did not grow musical taste.

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If your computer crashes every time it hears Janet Jacksons 1989 song Rhythm Nation, its not because it shares the same musical tastes as you. Instead, it is happening because youre running an old, 5400 RPM hard drive that simply cant handle a specific frequency that the video resonates.

Not only would playing the video crash such a device - it would also crash a nearby device that isnt even playing the video. All it takes is for the frequency to physically reach the affected endpoint to have it crash.

It sounds too odd to be true, but according to a blog fromMicrosofts Raymond Chen, a colleague of mine shared a story from Windows XP product support. A major computer manufacturer discovered that playing the music video for Janet Jacksons Rhythm Nation would crash certain models of laptops. Unique frequencies

It turns out that the song contained one of the natural resonant frequencies for the model of 5400 rpm laptop hard drives that they and other
manufacturers used," Chen noted.

"The manufacturer worked around the problem by adding a custom filter in the audio pipeline that detected and removed the offending frequencies during audio playback. Read more

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Even though the flaw might sound trivial, researchers found it relevant
enough to list it on the register of Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs).

It's listed as CVE-2022-38392 and, according to The Register , has already been acknowledged by security vendor Tenable.

So in the highly unlikely case that youre running a computer with an old, sluggish 5400-RPM hard disk drive, make sure to keep it away from anyone who might still enjoy Janet Jackson's music. Here's our rundown of the best firewalls right now

Via: The Register



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/turns-out-janet-jackson-is-the-cybersecurity-ri sk-we-never-saw-coming/


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